


Let Your Love Be Strong

by orphan_account



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Post-3x10, angst central tbh, but then some fluff i promise, growing back together again, in which someone reminds jemma that she's not responsible for the choices of others
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-23
Updated: 2015-12-23
Packaged: 2018-05-08 17:11:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5506097
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-3x10. </p><p>In the aftermath of Maveth, some things have to change. Jemma just never imagined that it would be her relationship with Fitz. Drowning in the aftermath of her choices, she wants nothing more than to cling to him--but Fitz has his own demons to fight, and this might be one thing he can't help her with. </p><p>In which Jemma learns how to forgive herself and Fitz learns a thing or two about self-preservation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This was only about half-done until I read notapepper's amazing The Will of the Few and then I was inspired to crank the rest out. So thanks, Pep! 
> 
> This shoulda been a one-shot but once it reached 22 pages, I realized I kind of needed to break it up into two for ease of reading. The second chapter is already written, and will either be posted tonight or tomorrow morning :)

**[Days Since Maveth: Three]**

 

Three days after the return from Planet Hell, Bobbi finds her. It’s the middle of the night and Jemma’s sitting on the couch with arms wrapped around herself, staring blankly at a wall.

 

“Jemma,” Bobbi gasps in surprise. “You scared me. I didn’t see you there.”

 

Jemma jumps slightly. “Bobbi. Hello.”

 

One look at Jemma’s tear-stained face causes Bobbi to move closer. “Are you alright?”

 

“Oh, I’m fine,” Jemma attempts. She smiles bravely, Bobbi thinks, but it crumbles on the corners and Jemma has to look away quickly as the tears begin again.

 

“Of course you’re not _fine,”_ Bobbi insists. “And because our therapist turned out to be a murderous Inhuman, I guess I’ll have to be the next best thing.“

 

Jemma flinches, hard, and Bobbi recoils as well as she thinks of the bodies littered around that castle. She’d meant it as a joke, but now she sees her mistake.

 

“All those people,” Jemma whispers. “I killed all those people.”

 

Bobbi shakes her head, reaching out to place her palm on Jemma’s shoulder. “Hey, don’t do this. You made the call. You wouldn’t have made it out alive if you hadn’t let Garner out of that box.”

 

Jemma laughs humorlessly. “And perhaps that would have been fitting, wouldn’t it? Letting the man I love back onto that _hellish_ planet, releasing Lash, now he can hardly stand to look at me.”

 

Bobbi swallows. “He’s trying to give you space. To let you grieve.”

 

Jemma shuts her eyes. “I am grieving, of course I am. I _loved_ Will. At least I think I did, and I may never—I may never understand, what those feelings were but I think that somewhere, deep down, I _knew_ —“

 

Jemma’s voice breaks and she rubs one hand over her eyes.

 

“I _knew_ that Will was dead. Intellectually, I needed to prove it. I needed to try and save him, to do what I couldn’t back on that planet…but I knew that he didn’t survive.”

 

Bobbi rubs her thumb in little circles. “I know that instinct. It’s when…you just know. I always _know,_ intuitively, when Hunter is in trouble.”

 

Jemma nods wildly. “Yes, exactly. When I came to in Fitz’s arms, sitting in the rubble, I _knew_ Will couldn’t have made it. It’s what allowed me to wait so long before I even tried to get him back, but after I had dinner with Fitz…I’ve already grieved him, in some ways. This is—this is more real. Now I know that he’s really gone, and that it was my fault, but that’s not even what I feel worst about.”

 

“Jemma, you held up under torture. You didn’t tell them it was Fitz who took you back through, Fitz did that himself. Most importantly, you can’t blame yourself for the things that others do to protect you,” Bobbi says softly. She lets go of the woman in front of her and slides the side of her t-shirt down, revealing her scar. “I did this for Hunter. Because I couldn’t stand to see him hurt.”

 

Bobbi chokes down a small sob of her own. The bullet hole has healed over, her leg is doing better, and what remains of her lung has proved itself time and time again that it is ready now, it is strong, but sometimes she still feels like she’s not.

 

“And Hunter, he blamed himself so much for what Ward did to me. That he wasn’t fast enough, or that I was willing to take this bullet for him, but _I_ chose to do it. Not because he couldn’t handle it, but because _I_ couldn’t handle it. I couldn’t handle losing him. And Fitz, he made the same choice. He couldn’t stand to lose you to that planet again, or worse.”

 

Jemma snorts. “There’s not much worse than that planet.”

Bobbi shrugs. “And I don’t think there’s anything worse than that warehouse. That’s the thing, Jemma, we all have the place where our nightmares live. And I know it must hurt, that Fitz went to yours, and he couldn’t bring Will home, but—“

 

“It’s got nothing to do with Will,” Jemma blurts out. Bobbi’s eyes widen and Jemma sucks in a sharp breath, as if to prepare herself for the backlash of what she needs to say. “Maybe it’s because I already felt, in my heart, that Will was gone. Maybe it’s just that I can’t imagine my life without him, but when that pod came through I hoped it would be Fitz.”

 

“You didn’t want Will to be dead,” Bobbi states, factually, just as a confirmation to Jemma that she knows what she means. Jemma shakes her head.

 

“No, of course I didn’t want that. Of course not. I _wanted_ Will to come back, after all those years. I wanted to help him and I wanted him to get a chance to experience _life_ again, not just survival, but…”

 

She trails off, eyes wandering toward the corner of the room, and Bobbi quickly picks it up for her.

 

“But you didn’t want to experience that _with_ him,” Bobbi says gently. “You wanted something else.”

 

Jemma nods, face crumbling with tears. The guilt practically radiates off of her in palpable waves. “I wanted to get him back so that he could live. So that _I_ could live again, with Fitz. I just wanted to be with him and I couldn’t do that until I knew one way or another that Will was safe or that he was dead. And that doesn’t mean—I know it seems like—I didn’t—“

 

“It doesn’t mean you didn’t love him,” Bobbi reminds her. Her arms circle around Jemma’s shoulders and Jemma’s head falls to Bobbi’s collarbone as she sobs. “Shh, I know. You did. And you did everything you could, for both of them, Jemma. For Fitz and for Will.”

 

Jemma attempts to shake her head in disagreement but she can’t.

 

“What Fitz must think of me,” Jemma cries. “What everyone must think of me. I know what Hunter says—“

 

Bobbi squeezes her a bit tighter. “Hey. Hunter’s an idiot, and he’s projecting. Don’t even get me started on that guy’s jealousy. I never _asked_ him to buy Clint a ticket from Phoenix…”

 

Bobbi bites down on her lip to keep herself from continuing her story. That’s not what this conversation is about and Jemma needs this, she needs this time with someone who can at least try to put her mind and heart at ease. Bobbi can’t imagine the crushing weight on her shoulders, but the least she can do is try.

 

“And Fitz? Fitz thinks you’re amazing. That you’re his best friend and that he loves you,” Bobbi explains. Jemma calms down into soft hiccupping cries.

 

“This just isn’t how I ever imagined things happening,” Jemma mumbles. “I wanted to have a chance, to explain. To explain to Will that he was right. Fitz is my favorite word and my favorite everything else and that I couldn’t have survived without Will but that I never would have been able to live on that planet, the way that he did, for all those years. With nothing but him. I was running around with my phone on me at all times even though at that point it was about as useful as a rock. It was dead weight but it was _proof,_ that I had lived _here._ That Fitz existed, in some timeline, in some universe. That he was _mine_ and I told myself that I let go of him but I don’t think I ever…”

 

Bobbi runs a comforting hand down Jemma’s arm and simply listens, allowing her to continue with her thought process. Bobbi is fairly certain that Jemma hasn’t even really thought this far ahead, that she’s talking through her feelings in real-time, and she would hate to interrupt.

 

“I wanted to explain that all to Fitz, too, but it felt…it felt cheap, to do any of that while Will was still out there in some other galaxy. Only he was _dead_ , and he’d done that for _me,_ so that I could keep living.”

 

“Maybe he knew, too. Maybe he knew that you never would have been able to live the way that he had, even with him as your company,” Bobbi tells her. “Maybe that’s why he did what he did for you.”

 

Jemma sniffles loudly for a long moment. “I think he did. He tried to talk to me, about Fitz and about the team, after I’d lost all hope of coming home and I refused. I couldn’t—I couldn’t bear to picture any of you, to talk about you all as if any of you belonged to the life I was going to live, there, on that planet. Least of all Fitz. I _never_ wanted Fitz to be there.”

 

“But he did go, and he survived,” Bobbi reminds her. “He’s in one piece, just down the hallway there. Probably asleep, I’d think.”

 

Jemma nods, shakily removing herself from Bobbi’s hold. “He suffered a sever laceration to his temple. His shoulder was partially dislocated by Ward, he has abrasions on his torso from his fight with…with Maveth.”

 

“And you have two broken ribs,” Bobbi says. “A concussion that is only just about healed, and a bunch of other cuts and scrapes and bruises. You two have been through the ringer, and you deserve a break.”

 

“All I’ve done since returning from the planet is try to find a way back, to save Will, and now all I’ve managed to do is set an evil being loose on this planet. I don’t deserve a break. My work is just getting started.”

 

Bobbi sighs heavily. “Look, I’m obviously not a therapist. I’ve got a whole laundry list of my own issues, but I can tell you one thing that I know is true. You don’t have to go through this alone. As far as what happened to you in that castle, I’ve been where you were.”

 

Jemma’s eyes stray toward Bobbi’s knee, and the blonde smiles sadly.

 

“I was drowning in it all for a long time. I thought I’d never be the same, that I couldn’t ever do it. And that I’d never even want to be the way I was before, and maybe I’m not, but I think that I’m better. I’m less reckless. I started listening to what my heart wanted. I don’t even know that I realized how much I loved Hunter until there was a real, actual risk that I could lose him.”

 

Jemma nods pensively. “I certainly know a thing or two about that.”

 

“I know you do,” Bobbi says, squeezing her hand. “So, Simmons, my best advice for you is that you’ve got to swim back up from the bottom of the ocean. You’ve done it once, you can do it again.”

 

Jemma looks up at her as Bobbi stands, eyes shining with something that Bobbi can’t quite place.

 

“I don’t think he’ll—I don’t think he’ll take me, anymore.”

 

Bobbi outright laughs. “You could do a hell of a lot of horrible things and he’d still love you.”

 

Jemma’s face falls with the guilt of it, because it’s true and she knows that.

 

“But hey,” Bobbi interrupts. “Don’t kid yourself, Jemma. Fitz risked the safety of the entire world for you. That was his choice, not yours, and in all honesty, it was a selfish one. And you still love him, don’t you?”

 

“Of course I do.”

 

Bobbi winks. “Of course you do.”

 

Jemma watches Bobbi walk away and there’s a heavy sense of relief settling into her bones. Just getting it out there, speaking the words, feels as though part of the weight weighing her down has been lifted. For a fleeting moment she contemplates doing the thing she’s wanted to do ever since she grabbed him on Zephyr One. She thinks about slipping into his door, crawling into bed beside him, and letting the gentle thrum of his heartbeat lull her to sleep.

 

But she still has to do the work, and she knows it. Sure, she’d known, somewhere deep down inside of her, that the chances of Will being alive were incredibly low. She’d made some semblance of peace with it but this is the real thing and it’s going to take a little more time.

 

***

**[Days Since Maveth: Twenty-Four]**

 

She makes it through three weeks of taking her space and thinking through her various emotions before she’s standing at his door, shifting nervously on her feet as she knocks anxiously. Her heart pounds fast in her chest as the seconds drag on. Feeling rather pathetic as she does so, she steps against the wood of the door and presses her ear, finding no indication of him moving around inside.

 

She knows there’s no possible way he’s sleeping yet, as he’s never been able to fall asleep before 10:30 in their more than 10 years of friendship. There’s only a couple of other places he could be, and she runs through them as she tries to calm her own panic.

 

She checks the garage first. Ever since his return from Maveth, he’s spent most of his time working there rather than the lab. It was a painful reminder of their time apart after the Pod. He had mumbled some excuse about less people and a quieter space when she’d attempted to ask him about it, but she hadn’t bought it for a second. Fitz had never required quiet to work; that was usually _her_ problem. She hadn’t pressed the issue though. If he needed space from her, she would give it to him. If he never wanted to be near her again, she wouldn’t fight him on it.

 

The garage is dark and empty so she moves forward to the kitchen, where there is also no Fitz in sight. Taking a deep breath, she heads off toward the lab, socked feet making very little noise on the floor of the Playground. It’s always strange, to see the base so silent, but in the aftermath of their latest catastrophe the Playground has remained fairly quiet. The Science Division has been busy at work, trying to figure out what the gel suspension used by Hydra on the Inhumans is actually made out of, as well as trying to develop some sort of weapon that will allow Daisy’s team to incapacitate Lash without having to get too close.

 

She finds him, finally, hunched over a drafting table. Her heart drops with the thought that he’s working in the lab after hours just to avoid her. His leg bounces in irritation as he murmurs to himself. Jemma stands back and watches him for several long moments. It’s been weeks since she’d been able to properly lay eyes on him, and she can’t help but admire the curve of his shoulders and the dexterity of his hands as he fiddles with the specs in front of him.

 

She clears her throat and he jumps, knocking several of his instruments onto the floor. It’s a clumsiness she hasn’t seen from him in a long time and it’s both nostalgic and upsetting.

 

“Hi Fitz,” she says softly.

 

“Simmons,” he responds plainly. He bends down to gather his fallen objects. “What can I do for you?”

 

_What can I do for you?_

 

It’s a simple enough question and she’s sure he means it as one, but her rapidly cycling thoughts immediately twists it into an accusation. He’d done everything for her, to get her back, and everything for her afterward.

 

“Nothing,” she finally responds. She doesn’t want or need him to do anything for her. “Nothing at all.”

 

He doesn’t seem altogether sure what to do with this information, turning his attention back to the drafting table. “Ah, okay.”

 

“I just wanted to see you,” she blurts out, stepping further into the lab. He freezes but doesn’t look up at her, so she takes it as an invitation to continue. “I…well, it’s been so long since we actually got to _talk,_ and _—“_

Fitz cuts her off with a heavy sigh, running one hand through his hair as he turns to look at her. Now that she’s closer she can see the dark circles under his eyes, the sunken appearance of his cheeks. One glance and she knows that he’s not sleeping, not properly eating, not taking care of himself, and it breaks her heart that it’s taken three weeks for her to notice.

 

“I’m sorry I haven’t been there for you,” he murmurs quietly, eyes full of apology. “It just didn’t feel—appropriate for me to be the one to help you through this. I—I killed him, and—“

 

“You did no such thing!” Jemma exclaims. He seems as taken aback by this as he was by her appearance in the lab to begin with. “That Inhuman _monster_ killed Will Daniels. You just made sure he wouldn’t have to be a vessel for It.”

 

Fitz gulps and shakes his head. “It doesn’t always feel like that.”

 

She moves with little thought, reaching for him on instinct. He backs away in a little shuffle that wounds her.

 

“Fitz…”

 

He licks his lips and pinches at the bridge of his nose. “Jemma, I’m so sorry. But I can’t…I want to be there for you _so badly_ but everything…there’s too much. When I’m with you, you make me feel like…and Daisy made me promise that I wouldn’t…that I’d try to figure out how to be here for me and I’m trying, I really am, so—“

 

“So you want me to leave you alone,” she whimpers. She stumbles back with the weight of it and feels a temporary flash of anger at her friend.

 

 _What the hell does she know?_ Jemma thinks bitterly. Then she shakes herself. Daisy knows a hell of a lot, especially about grief and even about Fitz. She knows more than Jemma, about his life for those six months that she was on another planet.

 

Fitz opens his eyes to look at her and there’s tears in them. She can’t stand to see him feel _guilty_ about this one gesture of emotional self-preservation.

 

“She’s right,” Jemma admits. “You shouldn’t deal with this. But we’re still…we’re still friends, right?”

 

Fitz lets out a ragged breath and nods, hands on his hips. “Of course. Of course we are, I’d never do that to you. I’m not trying to…to punish you, or anything, it’s not…”

 

“You need me to take my time,” she fills in. His eyes light up for a moment and she feels the corners of her mouth tick ever so slightly upward. Even after these distant weeks, she still _knows_ him, can still follow his thought process as well as she can follow her own.

 

“Yes,” he breathes. “Yes, exactly.”

 

“Okay,” she says firmly. “I can do that. But I need to tell you now, so that you know it, that I want to be with you. In whatever way I can be, for the rest of my life, and I meant every word I ever said about our future, and Perthshire, and all of it. I’m _devastated_ by what happened to Will, but if you hadn’t come back in that pod…”

 

Her voice drifts for a moment and her hands clench into fists at her sides.

 

“I would have been inconsolable. I certainly would not have been walking around like I am now. I doubt I’d be able to _speak_ if you were gone forever and I know that because for those nine days, I—I got a taste of what that might be like.”

 

Fitz gulps, leaning slightly in her direction before he pulls himself back.

 

“So I need you to know that you never would have been my second choice. I needed to know if he was alive or dead, and I should have told you before that I wanted to be with you and not with him. I should have said it before we knew he was dead because then maybe you could believe me.”

 

Her voice cracks and now he really does move forward, as if to comfort her. She waves her hands wildly in front of her and steps further away. She doesn’t want that from him, not right now, especially after what he’d said about Daisy’s advice.

 

“I know you can’t shoulder this burden for me,” she presses on. “But please, if you need _anything_ at all, let me shoulder a burden for you, okay? I know…I know more happened on that planet than you’ve told me and I can tell you’re not sleeping or eating and…I just want to help. If you want or need me to.”

 

Fitz nods, hardly trusting his voice. “Alright. I’ll um…I’ll keep that in mind.”

 

She manages a twisted little smile and then allows herself a moment of selfishness. She flings herself into his arms and squeezes him tightly, inhaling the scent of him for the first time in so long.

 

“I’ll see you around, Fitz.”

 

He gives her a watery little grin.

 

“See you around, Jemma.”

 

***

**[Days Since Maveth: Twenty-Nine]**

 

It’s not long after their tearful conversation in the lab before she’s throwing open the door to his bunk in the middle of the night and rushing to his bed.

 

“STOP!” he screams, head tossing from side to side on his sweat-soaked pillow. “I’LL DO WHATEVER YOU WANT, PLEASE!”

 

She swallows and kneels next to him, grabbing one of his flailing arms as gently as she can.

 

“Fitz? Fitz, wake up!” she says loudly but gently. “It’s just a dream. Fitz, wake up!”

 

“I’ll go,” he whimpers. “I’ll go, just don’t take her back there, please—“

 

Her heart stops entirely and she moves to sit on his bed. She grabs him by the shoulders and begins shaking him, but this only seems to make things worse. She vaguely hears someone in the doorway but she doesn’t turn to see who it is. Her focus is solely on his crumpled face, tears streaming off of her cheeks and onto the vest top that he sleeps in.

 

“You’re not Will,” he groans. “You’re not him.”

 

“FITZ! PLEASE!” Jemma shouts desperately. He shoots up, throwing her off of him.

 

“WE HAVE TO GO!”  


Rather than scrambling away from him or remaining on the floor, she immediately jumps to her feet and sits beside him on the mattress. Her hands come up to rub up and down the lengths of his arms.

 

“Shh, Fitz,” she soothes. “It’s okay. It was a dream. I’m right here, okay? You’re alright.”

 

He blinks at her wildly, then stares past her at where Daisy leans in the doorway, arms crossed and brow furrowed.

 

“It didn’t work,” Fitz mumbles to himself, reaching onto his bedside table and pressing several buttons on a small black device. He throws it violently against the wall and it shatters.

 

“What didn’t work?” Jemma asks, feeling utterly disoriented.

 

“Soundproofing,” Daisy fills in. Fitz narrows his eyes at her in accusation but she presses on. “He built that to soundproof his bunk, so he wouldn’t wake anyone. I come by to check in every couple of hours, but…”

 

Jemma’s stomach turns over and she presses a hand to her mouth to keep herself from gasping or sobbing or worse.

 

“Can I please have a brief moment alone with Fitz?” Jemma asks Daisy, not even looking in her direction.

 

Daisy nods immediately. “Of course. Feel better, Fitz.”

 

She shuts and locks the door behind her, leaving them alone in the darkness and silence of his room. “Fitz, you can’t do this to yourself.”

 

“Do what to myself?”

 

“This!” she exclaims, gesturing at the broken pieces of the gadget, barely visible in the dark. “Please, let me help you. I know you can’t help me right now. I don’t _want_ you to help me, but I want to help you, and I think that I can.”

 

“Jemma,” he groans. “Please, don’t…I didn’t want this to become an issue. That’s why I made the bloody soundproof device.”

 

One of her hands reaches up to cup his cheek and he immediately leans into her touch.

 

“I know that this isn’t one of those things that we can necessarily fix together,” she tells him. “But at least let me try to help you, okay?”

 

She can see his weary expression fade to acceptance and he slowly begins to nod his assent.

 

“Good. Now tell me what really happened on Maveth, Fitz. All you told me was about Will. What actually happened to Ward?”

 

Fitz collapses back into his pillows, scrubbing his hands over his eyes and clearing his throat before he begins. He sounds hoarse, from all the yelling he’d been doing, and she fetches him the water from his desk.

 

“It was Coulson,” he says. “He didn’t…he crushed Ward’s chest with his mechanical hand. He could’ve brought him back, put him in custody. Hell, even shooting him with a bullet would have been—“

 

He breaks off. “I don’t mean to say that I didn’t want him dead, Jemma. I tried to do it myself, that’s when he went for my arm.”

 

Her fingers ghost over his dislocated shoulder. “I know you didn’t want him to be a free man.”

 

“I saw something in Coulson,” Fitz admits. “Something in him that I’d seen in Ward before. It was like I was watching a completely different person. The same way that It possessed Will, almost.”

 

She’s surprised that she has no emotional reaction to the mention of Will’s name or to his fate. There’s a brief twinge at the thought but it doesn’t freeze her or distract her focus from the man in front of her.

 

“Like it wasn’t really him,” Jemma says. Fitz nods.

 

“Exactly. For a minute there I thought maybe It had taken over Coulson, but I think the body has to be dead already. I was so desperate to get him back through the portal that we nearly didn’t make it. He was so busy trying to murder Ward that he didn’t…he wasn’t even trying to come back.”

 

She shifts so that she sits beside him, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and tugging him against her so that his head falls between her neck and shoulder. He takes a shuddering breath and relaxes into her warmth.

 

“You would have died for him,” she says quietly. He nods.

 

“I didn’t want to leave him but I was so overwhelmed with everything that had just happened…”

 

One hand draws little circles on his shoulder, the way he always does when he hugs her, and the other reaches into his hair, dragging her nails lightly along his scalp. The dampness of his head doesn’t bother her in the slightest.

 

“Get some rest,” she tells him softly. “I’ll be right here, okay? You’re not alone.”

 

And she stays, long after he’s fallen asleep. She’s so tempted to slip beneath the sheets and remain beside him for the entire night, but she wants to abide by his wishes. Just as morning breaks, she untangles herself from him and slips out of the door.

 

She snatches a t-shirt off of his messy floor just as she’s leaving and stuffs it beneath the pillow in her room, ignoring how pathetic it feels to want him near her so badly.


	2. Chapter 2

[ **Days Since Maveth: Forty]**

His distinct knock on her door makes her heart race and she leaps off of her bed to make a straight dash to the door. She swings it open and finds him standing there with two mugs of tea in hand.

 

“Fitz!” she exclaims altogether too eagerly. He smiles in return, more naturally than she’s seen in a long time. He hands her one of the mugs and takes a seat on the edge of her bed.

 

“Thought we could have some tea,” he mumbles, staring at his feet. She hides a grin behind her cup and climbs onto the mattress beside him, being sure not to sit too close and scare him off.

 

“It’s lovely,” she tells him. For a beat, her biggest fear comes true—that she’s finally run out of things to say to him. Then she chokes back a laugh because of course that could never happen. “Did you see the latest Who?”

 

He crinkles his nose. “I actually…I haven’t been watching it, without you.”

 

She doesn’t bother to hide how much this pleases her. “Good. Because I haven’t been watching it without you either.”

 

Fitz lets out a disbelieving, breathy little laugh that sets off the butterflies in her gut. “Alright, glad we’ll experience it together. Please tell me you haven’t been looking up spoilers again…”

 

Jemma rolls her eyes. “That was one time! We had no way to watch it, what else was I supposed to—“

 

“—we live with one of the best hackers in the world, of _course_ we had a way to watch it.”

 

Jemma grumbles a half-hearted counterpoint, earning a snort of laughter from him.

 

“I actually came to talk to you about something,” Fitz says, and she immediately senses the change in mood.

 

“Oh?” she asks hopefully. She shifts as close to him as she can without being too obvious about it.

 

“Mhm,” he hums. He seems nervous, one leg bouncing up and down in his tell-tale sign of fear. “I um…I’m going on a field mission. Tomorrow.”

 

“What?” she gasps, tea sloshing onto her legs. “Ow!”

 

She stands, putting her mug on the dresser. Fitz quickly follows, trying to help her. His hands hover awkwardly near her thighs, unsure what to do with them.

 

“Shit, Jemma! Are you okay?”

 

“I’m fine,” she insists, brushing him off. “I’m fine. But you. You’re going into the field again? So soon?”

 

“It’s been over a month,” he reminds her gently. She wonders if his gentleness is because he feels bad, reminding her of how long Will has been gone, but she doesn’t need the reminder and it doesn’t hurt the way he seems to think it does.

 

“I know that,” she huffs. “But Fitz, you still have a hard time sleeping.”

 

“I know,” he admits with a defeated shrug. “But they need someone who can disable an engine, and—“

 

“And one of the other engineers can do it!” she practically shrieks.

 

“They can’t!” Fitz insists. “I _designed_ the plane, I’m the only one who can disable it mechanically while it’s running without getting blown to pieces.”

 

Jemma blinks rapidly, jaw dropping open. She watches the realization of his slip-up fall on his face.

 

“I meant—“

 

“You’re going to _disable an engine while it is ON?”_

“Well…yeah, that’s the idea.”

 

“And given that this is a _plane_ ,” Jemma continues, her voice low and steady in tone but her barely restrained anger quite obvious, “I assume that said plane will be _in the air_ while you do this?”

 

Fitz sighs, shoulders slumping in defeat. “I know you don’t think I can do this.”

 

She splutters, throwing her hands up. “Of course I think you can do it. I _know_ you can do this. I don’t _want_ you to do this.”

 

His brow furrows. “Why?”

 

“You said you weren’t strong enough to live in a world without me in it,” she reminds him heatedly. He flinches at the words. “Has it occurred to you that I’m not strong enough for that either?”

 

“You _did_ live in a world without me in it, seemed perfectly happy there,” he responds bitterly. Immediately after the words escape his mouth, he clamps his jaw shut, muscle twitching. “I didn’t mean that.”

 

“Yes you did,” she says, swallowing down the tightness in her throat. “But that’s okay. You’re allowed to be upset about it.”

 

He pinches at the bridge of his nose in frustration and she reaches up to grab his hand, pulling it back down.

 

“I mean it, Fitz. But I need you to know that if anything happens to you, I won’t be able to take it.”

 

He doesn’t seem all that convinced, but he nods anyway. She takes several calming breaths and then makes an attempt at a bright smile.

 

“Since you’re here, why don’t we watch one of those Who episodes we’ve been neglecting?”

 

He seems grateful for the smallest hint at normalcy. They sit side by side against her headboard and watch the Doctor and Clara. For the first several minutes, they stay silent, and Jemma’s not sure who started it, but before she knows it they’re swapping theories and chattering. Her hand flutters to his shoulder when she makes a particularly good point and his fingers tighten on her leg during a tense scene.

 

One episode turns into two, which turns into three.

 

By the time he leaves, she nearly forgets that he’s going on a mission tomorrow, but it doesn’t leave her thoughts completely. Just as he starts to walk away, she grabs his hand and tugs him backward. He stares at her earnestly and expectantly.

 

“Come back to me,” she says softly.

 

He nods resolutely before shuffling a few doors down to his own room.

 

**[Days Since Maveth: Forty-One]**

When Fitz comes off of the quinjet, she’s the first person he sees. She comes flying at him in a blur of checker print and brown hair, colliding with his chest so forecefully that he stumbles backward into Hunter.

 

Hunter claps Fitz on the back and ruffles Jemma’s hair, her face tucked away into Fitz’s neck.

 

“Good work today, mate,” Hunter praises. He throws him a wink over his shoulder and leaves the two scientists alone.

 

“You came back to me,” she whispers. It sends a little shiver down his spine and he takes a moment to soak in the scent of her shampoo and the press of her against him. Unfortunately, that pressing is also causing him a huge amount of pain, and he’s unable to hold back the hiss any longer.

 

She pulls back immediately, holding him at arms length and examining him with fearful eyes.

  
“Where does it hurt?” she demands. “What happened?”

 

“Here,” he groans, gesturing at his side. “Bit of one of the turbines broke off—“

 

“And lodged into your side!” she gasps, pressing tentative fingers near the piece of metal stuck inside of him. He lets out a little shout of pain and she grabs onto his hand, tugging him toward the medical bay. “Ugh, Fitz! You should have said something. You could have internal bleeding, for godsake.”

 

She practically throws him onto a cot and he grits his teeth. “Hey! Careful, not like I have a bit of propeller lodged in me or anything.”

 

“And whose fault is that?” Jemma asks primly. She puts on a pair of goggles, snapping on some gloves. She begins cutting off his long-sleeve he’d been wearing beneath his tact vest, causing him to yelp.

 

“What are you doing?!”

 

“Getting this thing off so that I can work,” she says plainly. She hopes he doesn’t notice the way her breath hitches as his torso is exposed. “This is going to hurt, Fitz. I’m going to give you something first.”

 

She turns around to get a vial of pain medication, tying a rubber band onto his arm to find a vein. He looks toward the ceiling, never one for needles, and she gives his knee a supportive little squeeze just before she injects the dose of morphine.

 

“Let me know when that sets in,” she says. “Then I’ll get started, okay?”

 

All the muscles in his face slacken and he grins at her goofily. “Woah. That’s definitely…yep, that’s in there.”

 

She helps him lay down flat and moves to his other side. “Let me know if it’s too painful, alright?”

 

“M’kay.”

 

“Alright, put your arm up by your head, Fitz.”

 

He adjusts, folding his arm beneath his head and watching her work. She clicks on the little lamps on the side of her goggles, focusing intently on removing the metal from his flesh. He hardly feels it, given the rather heavy dose of pain medication she’d given him.

 

“Hey Jemma?” he asks as she finishes bandaging him up.

 

“Yes?”

 

“Sorry I got hurt,” he murmurs. “I tried really hard not to.”

 

She runs a hand over his hair, allowing herself this small indulgence, and watches as he practically purrs beneath her ministrations. “I’m sure you did, Fitz. But you got the job done, hm?”

 

“Mhm,” he hums proudly. “I did. Took down a Hydra plane all by m’self.”

 

“Wasn’t Hunter there?” she asks teasingly. He pouts.

 

“May was flying the quinjet and Hunter was really just there to make sure I didn’t fall right outta the sky.”

 

“Very important job, that.”

 

He gazes up at her more openly than he has since he came back from Maveth, eyes sparkling with a combination of awe and morphine. “Thanks for taking care of me.”

 

“I’ll always take care of you, Fitz,” she says sincerely. “How about we put you in bed now, hm? You need to rest. This wound is pretty bad. I stitched you up but you need to be careful, as to not pull them apart.”

 

He nods, standing shakily and allowing Jemma to take a good amount of his weight as she walks him down to the bunks. She types in his code and gently places him in bed. She puts a pillow against the wall, since it’s on the same side as his wound, and runs to the kitchen to fetch him some water.

 

“The medication will probably make you thirsty,” she informs him. “So there’s some water right here. You just rest up, okay? You can tell me all about the mission once you’re feeling better.”

 

“Stay?” he asks hopefully, patting the bed.

 

She knows she should probably say no, since he’s hardly in his right mind, but the way he’d held her before the morphine most definitely meant that he still wanted her around. She kicks off her boots and lays down gently beside him. It takes some adjusting, what with the pillow taking up so much room, but eventually they get comfortable with Fitz’s arm beneath her head, her legs tangled up in his.

 

“Today was the best,” he sighs. “Got to be a hero and got the girl.”

 

Jemma can’t hold back the giggle that pours out of her. “You’ve finally got it right, Fitz. You’re the hero. I’ve been telling you that for _years.”_

 

He makes a contented little noise and shuts his eyes. “Night, Jem.”

 

“Goodnight, Fitz.”

 

She doesn’t even mean to fall asleep, not really, but her concern for him had been crushing during the previous night and she’d been unable to sleep. After tossing and turning for so long, she’d gotten only a few hours at best, and the comforting warmth of him beside her, tucked between his flannel bed sheets, lulls her into a nap before she means to.

 

When she wakes up, Fitz is staring at her. As soon as her eyes open, he turns to press his face into the pillow, tips of his ears red. Deciding she has nothing left to lose, she brushes her hand over his shoulders.

 

“What’s wrong?” she mumbles, still hazy with sleep.

 

“Just a bit embarrassed,” he responds. The pillow muffles his words but she can still make them out.

 

“Oh Fitz, there’s no reason to be embarrassed.”

 

He opens the eye that’s visible to her and she laughs.

 

“Really! You _were_ the hero. And you _did_ get the girl.”

 

He rolls over onto his back, lower lip clenched between his teeth. “Yeah?”

 

“You dove through a hole in the universe for me,” she says lightly, turning on her side to face him. “Twice.”

 

“That’s not why…I don’t want you to—to feel that way about me just because of what I do for you--”

 

He huffs out a dramatic sigh and she doesn’t let him continue his spiral.

 

“That’s not why I love you,” she continues casually. As soon as the words leave her mouth, his entire expression shifts. “It’s not because of anything you’ve done for me, it’s not that I feel indebted to you. When you gave me that oxygen, you were incredibly selfless. When you dove through that hole in the universe, you were persistent, determined. Someone who never gives up on the people he believes in. You opened that portal because you’re so bloody smart, Fitz. You’re funny and loyal and unbelievably kind, kind enough to have nightmares about the death of a man that you hate. That’s just the beginning of why.”

 

His body goes completely stiff beside her and she takes it as her cue to let him process. She presses a lingering kiss to his temple and rolling off of the bed, snatching her boots off of the floor.

 

“I’ll be in the lab today, if you need me. I’ll send someone with your next dose of pain meds, you need to keep resting.”

 

She shuts the door behind her and lifts a trembling hand to her hair.

 

She’d finally done it, nearly forty days after Bobbi told her to tell him how she feels.

 

***

**[Days Since Maveth: Fifty-Six]**

She’s watching the sunrise when he finds her. They still haven’t spoken about what she said in his bunk, but they’ve continued catching up on Doctor Who and sharing breakfast together. He’s finally made his way back into the lab, the last of his belongings finding their home on his desk beside hers once again. Even if this is it, even if their partnership and companionship are all she has for the rest of her life, she’s glad for it. When Fitz reaches her in the archway, he leans casually against the opposite wall, just as he did months before.

 

“Still doing this, huh?”

 

Jemma smiles at him, tucking her hair behind her ear. “Only sometimes, now.”

 

He sucks in a breath through his nose and stares straight ahead. “I’ve thought a lot about what you said.”

 

“The morning after your injury?”

 

“No,” he says. She raises her eyebrows, turning her head to look at him, and he shrugs. “Well, yeah. But it got me thinking about…before, too. Before you got sucked into the portal, in your recordings, the things you said once you came back—before I knew about Will.”

 

The name doesn’t sting anymore, and he doesn’t even flinch when he says it. Rationally, they probably aren’t _completely_ over what happened, but for now, it feels like they are. She still has the photo of him, tucked away in the ‘pictures’ file of her computer, but her background is a shot of the sunrise and her desk is surrounded by pictures of the team and, most particularly, a nearly perfect timeline of her relationship with Fitz. One picture for each year.

 

“Oh? And…what are your thoughts? About that,” Jemma says nervously, toying with the strings of his hoodie wrapped around her.

 

“I let my own stuff get in the way,” he says. She jolts a little bit, surprised by this. “I wasn’t really listening to you, I think. Especially…you’re the kinda person where you have to read between the lines, sometimes.”

 

Jemma smirks. “I’m working on that.”

 

“I noticed. Gave me quite the speech, Simmons.”

 

“And yet we still haven’t gotten to your thoughts on it,” she teases, fishing for him to continue.

 

“I’ve loved you for a long time. Can’t even pin-point the moment where it shifted but I know I’ve loved you in some way or other since I was seventeen. And here you are, wanting to be with me, and I’m…what? Pushing you away? Because I don’t feel good enough for you, because you had a relationship with someone else for a month on another planet and it’s just ridiculous.”

 

She laughs, long and hard, and he chuckles alongside her, finally turning away from the sunrise to stare at her.

 

“It really is,” she agrees. “But I do understand it. We’re only human, Fitz.”

 

“Yeah, well,” he sighs. “I’m done wasting time. Even the evil Inhuman knew that you loved me—“

 

“What?” Jemma interrupts. “We’re going to need to revisit that, later.”

 

“Later,” he agrees, scooting closer to her. She presses her shoulder against his and stares at their hands as he links them together.

 

“It’s not going to take me another twelve years to get a kiss, is it?” she asks quietly, eyes twinkling in the dawn light.

 

He rolls his eyes, smiling broadly as he turns his body toward her and tugs her into his chest.

 

“For all that sass I should make you,” he whispers, releasing her hand in favor of grasping her face gently in his hands.

 

“You wouldn’t dare,” she murmurs, places her hands on his chest and gazing up at him. “Besides, who says I have to wait for you, anyhow?”

 

She steps the last bit forward, closing any semblance of distance between them as she presses her lips to his. He tastes like his morning tea and his hands quickly slip away from her cheeks and into her hair when she sucks his bottom lip into her mouth. He sighs into her, parting his lips ever so slightly as he deepens the kiss. Unlike their first kiss, there is no desperation, no rush or hurry or nearly bruising force. Unlike their second kiss, there is no semblance of goodbye or missed chances. When they finally pull away several minutes later, they’ve long since missed the rest of the sunrise.

 

“You missed it,” he whispers, jerking his head toward the window without looking away from her.

 

She leans back into the brick wall, delighting in the way that he follows her, propping himself up with one hand near her head and leaving the other at her waist.

 

“I didn’t miss anything,” she grins, tugging him down by his shirt to kiss him softly once more.

 

“What do you think about dinner?” Fitz asks when she releases him. Her eyebrows raise.

 

“That’s a long ways away.”

 

He rolls his eyes. “You know what I mean. Just you and me, having dinner. Together.”

 

“Somewhere nice?”

 

“Somewhere _very_ nice,” he clarifies. She nuzzles his nose with hers and nods excitedly.

 

“That sounds lovely.”

 

They soak each other up for a long while until the rest of the base seems to stir in unison. The window is closer to the bunks of the lower-ranked agents and lab techs (which would really be a bonus for them if their rooms weren’t even smaller than the bunks on the bus) and Fitz tugs her away from the meandering agents, leading the way toward the lab.

 

“Hey wait, I have to get ready for work,” she says, breaking off to head to her room. “I’ll see you there, okay?”

 

“Yeah, alright,” he says. “See you in a minute.”

 

He’s not fully expecting her to peck him on the mouth before she turns into her room, but it pleases him to no end regardless. She quickly sheds her t-shirt and Fitz’s hoodie in favor of a light blue blouse. When she reaches the lab, Fitz is already scribbling madly on a notebook, tilting his head and staring at a simulation on the screen in front of him.

 

She shrugs on her lab coat, taking her rightful place at his side. “What are we looking at?”

 

“It’s the design for the Lash weapon,” he groans, throwing the pen down on the counter. “I can’t seem to get the heat distribution right.”

 

“Well, let me see it, then.”

 

She grabs his notes and clicks around on the computer. “What if instead of using hydrogen, we used chlorine trifluoride?”

 

He scoffs. “Sure, if we want to burn down any structure in a 100 kilometer radius!”

 

She rolls her eyes. “Of course I wasn’t suggesting that we exclusively use that. I’m saying if we use a blend of some kind—“

 

Fitz nods enthusiastically, jumping on board with her train of thought. “Yes! If we combine it with…”

 

They both dive into their work, moving around one another and handing tools and chemicals to each other without a single request. They don’t even notice Hunter and Bobbi in the doorway of the lab.

 

“Told you,” Bobbi grins smugly. “Less than sixty days.”

 

“Barely,” he huffs.

 

Hunter rolls his eyes but he can’t hide his approval of the sight in front of him. He nudges Bobbi along the hall toward the rest of the team. Fitz braces himself on the counter, one hand on each side of Simmons. He leans over her, watching her draw out a suggestion for chemical dispersal, chin notched perfectly over her shoulder.

 

The entire team watches the security footage of the lab during their lunch break. Daisy squeals excitedly and explains to Lincoln that _that_ is FitzSimmons. Fitz and Simmons, meanwhile, are nowhere to be found…until they emerge 20 minutes later, hair ruffled and shirts untucked.


End file.
